The best new annual flowers of 2019

The Penn State Trial Gardens in Lancaster County is one place where new annuals are put to the test each summer.

George Weigel | Special to PennLive

The best new annual flowers of 2019

A new line of old-fashioned impatiens that fight off deadly downy mildew disease, a zinnia that does shade, and what could be the best vinca yet top the list of interesting new annual flowers debuting in 2019.

Growers, local garden centers, and other plant experts picked those and more for our four-part, best-new-plants series we put together each January – a good month for gardeners to plan what to plant in the coming season.

Some of the following new annual flowers are available in seeds or plants online and in some plant catalogs. Most also will show up in plant form in selected local garden centers beginning in late April to early May.

The details:

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Imara Orange Star is one of the new line of disease-resistant impatiens. (Syngenta Flowers)

George Weigel | Special to PennLive

Impatiens Imara XDR series

Breeders have been hard at work for six years trying to bring back the old-fashioned bedding impatiens that once was the top-selling annual flower.

In 2012, a deadly downy mildew disease came out of nowhere and turned impatiens into a pariah almost overnight. Most gardeners switched to other plants or started buying expensive disease-resistant hybrids of bedding impatiens crossed with mildew-resistant New Guinea impatiens.

New for 2019 is a line of impatiens that look and perform like the originals. Called Imara XDR, it’s being touted by growers and garden centers as a solution to the 2012 mildew wipeout.

Being introduced by seed giant Syngenta Flowers, Imara XDR will come in seven colors – Orange, Orange Star, Red, Rose, Violet, Salmon Shades, and White. They grow about 12 inches tall and perform best in shade to part sun.

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Tattoo Papaya is one of the four new Tattoo vincas.

George Weigel | Special to PennLive

Vinca Tattoo series

Vinca is one of the best flowers for heat and dry weather. This new four-color series from PanAmerican Seed offers some of the biggest flowers yet as well as a multicolored patterning that looks like differing shades have been airbrushed onto the petals.

Plants grow 10 to 14 inches tall and bloom best in full sun. Blooms cover about two-thirds of the plants.

The series was good enough to earn the Industry's Choice Best New Variety Medal of Excellence at the Cultivate'18 growers trade show in Ohio. Grower Chris Wallen of the wholesale Quality Greenhouses near Dillsburg rates it as his favorite new annual flower of 2019, and Sinclair Adam, director of Penn State's Trial Gardens in Lancaster County, gave the three Tattoo colors in the trials nearly perfect scores. (Beam and Kephart both like the series as well.)

He adds that it performed just as well under shade cloth as it did in full sun. Both shade tolerance and mildew-resistance in wet weather are not usual strong suits of zinnias.

Holi Scarlet grows a compact 18 inches tall, and its blooms are orange-scarlet with yellow stamens.

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George Weigel | Special to PennLive

Calibrachoa Superbells Doublette Love Swept

This line of petunia look-alikes has become trendy in pots and hanging baskets for its heavy flowering and vibrant colors.

Doublette Love Swept is a new double-flowered variety for 2019 that Highland Gardens manager Erica Shaffer names as her favorite new annual flower.

“It’s a many-petaled pink whose petals spiral out from the center and end with a thin white edge,” she says. “I’m in love.”

Plants grow 8 to 10 inches tall and spread out about 16 inches in sun or light shade.

Another two-toned new pink calibrachoa worth checking out is MiniFamous Uno Double PinkTastic, a 12-inch-tall trailer that performed well enough to win a Fleuroselect Gold Medal in 2018 European trials.

Petchoa is a cross between petunias and calibrachoa. When crossed well, it results in “children” that have the best of both parents – the size and flower power of petunias and the rich colors of calibrachoa.

Sakata Seed is introducing a winning series called SuperCal Premium that grabbed my eye among the rows and rows of trial annuals at Penn State's Trial Gardens in Lancaster County last summer.

Especially showy were the colors Caramel Yellow (a bicolor of soft gold with burgundy throats) and French Vanilla (creamy white with throats of gold and rosy-red).

SuperCal Premium plants grow in 18- to 20-inch mounds and have bigger flowers than standard SuperCal plants. They’re ideal in baskets and pots.

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Euphorbia Diamond Mountain is bigger than other euphorbias of this type.

George Weigel | Special to PennLive

Euphorbia Diamond Mountain

This mounded annual with the wispy white flowers similar to baby’s breath has been slowly catching on ever since the first one, Diamond Frost, came along a dozen years ago.

Since then, breeders have been focusing on more compact and heavier flowering versions. Diamond Mountain goes the opposite direction in that it's a bigger plant than Diamond Frost – growing up to 3 feet tall.

Karen Adams, a grower at the wholesale Quality Greenhouses near Dillsburg, picks this as her favorite 2019 annual because it's both long and heavy in bloom, low in care, and tough against both heat and drought. It'll grow in full sun to part shade.

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Gomphrena Truffula Pink is both compact and heavy-blooming. (Proven Winners)

George Weigel | Special to PennLive

Gomphrena Truffula Pink

Jason Smith, another annuals grower at Quality Greenhouses, thinks this pink bloomer is the best of the 2019 crop of newcomers.

He says Truffula Pink tolerates heat very well, is more compact than most other gomphrenas at 2 feet tall, and does as well in the ground as in pots.

Gomphrena produces small cotton-like ball flowers and does best in full sun. It also makes an excellent cut flower.

If you’re a fan of big bright flowers and dark leaves, check out this new begonia that performed well enough in national testing last year to earn a 2019 All-America Selections award.

Viking XL Red on Chocolate produces red flowers all summer, backdropped beautifully by the glossy leaves of dark burgundy that borders on black.

Plants grow about three-feet tall in full sun or part shade. They’re excellent in pots as well as in the ground.

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Endurance marigolds come in three colors. (W. Atlee Burpee Co.)

George Weigel | Special to PennLive

Marigold Endurance Mix

We could’ve used this one last year – a marigold variety that blooms as well in wet weather as in dry.

W. Atlee Burpee Co.'s new Endurance marigolds also don't set seed (a plus for those who don't like self-seeding flowers) and they're self-cleaning enough to not need regular deadheading of spent flowers as do most marigolds.

Endurance comes in a seed mix of three different colors – yellow, orange, and gold.